Water Contamination, Land Pollution & Hazardous Waste Material are issues families all across America are afflicted with daily.

Monday, July 26, 2010

Illinois Tougher Than Feds on Water Contamination

July 25, 2010 - Tucked in the southeastern suburbs of Cook County, there is a town on the brink of a budgetary disaster.

But a $2 million budget hole is the least of its worries.

A chemical has leached into a well in Sauk Village.

It's the same chemical that surfaced in a deep well in the scandal-marred village of Crestwood.

Because of the misdeeds uncovered in Crestwood, stricter state laws aimed at preventing another similar scandal and informing the public of contamination sooner were what led to the state clamping down on Sauk Village's use of the well.

The water contamination in Sauk Village is vastly different than that of Crestwood - the former stopped using the tainted well after alerted to its contamination and took it offline for public supply. Water samples have since come up clean.

Crestwood officials, however, were found to have kept use of that community's well as a portion of the village's total water supply hidden from regulators who had rendered it unsafe years before.